This invention relates to a webbed swimming glove, and more particularly to such a glove which has finger and thumb enclosing tubular portions joined by webs, which tubular portions are capable of bending in the closing direction of the hand and fingers yet which are substantially rigid against bending past a predetermined position in the direction of the opening of the hand and fingers.
It is well known that a swimmer can increase the pressure of his hands on the water and thereby swim faster if he can wear some sort of glove on his hand which increases the area of the water contacted when his hand moves through the water. It is also well known that the best way to hold the hand when it is acting against the water to move the swimmer forward is to cup the hand.
It is, of course, possible to provide the swimmer with a hand attached paddle which is rigid and properly shaped such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,328,812. Gloves, on the other hand, will flex so that the swimmer's hands can be used to grasp objects without removing the gloves.
Many prior art gloves have been developed in an attempt to increase the speed of a swimmer, but none of them have been entirely satisfactory. Most of them are simply a form of a conventional glove made of an appropriate flexible water impervious material with some sort of webbing between the fingers. One such glove is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 286,106. The fingers of the glove have even been extended in an effort to increase the area of the webbing which acts on the water during the hand movement through the water, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,078,133, and reinforcing rods have been added to help support the webbing, as in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,275,005, 1,712,655 and 1,777,050.
Some prior art gloves such as disclosed in Canadian Pat. No. 556,165, Italian Pat. No. 638,470 and French Pat. No. 1,248,039 have hinged joints but fail to provide a means to keep the hinged joints from buckling.
There are many drawbacks to the prior art gloves, some of which are the fact that they do not provide effective additional support to enable the hand to withstand the increased forces on it due to the presence of the web, that they cannot be adapted to cover the entire hand and that they do not make any provision for helping the swimmer cup his hand and keep it from buckling for the most efficient action on the water. The muscles of the hand and wrist are not sufficiently strong to stand up under the forces of a web significantly larger than the size of the hand moving through the water at the rate a swimmer can move his hand through the water, or in any event they will tire very quickly under the effect of such forces. It is even more difficult for a swimmer to keep his hand properly cupped when the forces of the water are exerted on a webbed glove as it is moved through the water. Even if he is able to cup his hand during the first few strokes with a prior art glove, his hand and wrist muscles will quickly tire and he will be unable to maintain the cup shape and keep the fingers from buckling.